Farmers make the most of a dry season

Farmers at Ouyen in north-west Victoria are firing up their harvesters for this year's grain season.

And after the driest winter in three decades many are feeling lucky there is anything to reap.

But they say better farming practices have helped them salvage something from a potentially disastrous year.

Farmer Ian Hastings says it is the driest winter since 1982 when paddocks were barely worth harvesting.

"In 1982 this paddock would have really struggled." Mr Hastings said.

"There would have been huge loss of moisture through the summer through evaporation, and we would have also had quite severe dust storms going on, so we would have had erosion occurring as well.

"So in '82 if we got 200 kilograms of hectare we would have done very well, lots of farmers got nothing."

Although the rainfall is similar, this season is different.

This year we hope to get 1.2, maybe 1.3 tonnes per hectare of this barley.

Ian Hastings, Ouyen farmer

"This year we would hope to get 1.2 maybe even 1.3 tonnes per hectare of this barley," Mr Hastings said.

For the past 15 years or so farmers in the region have been direct drilling seed and fertiliser into the ground rather than tilling the soil first.

"It's a very specific, expensive machine used to sow," Mr Hastings said.

"It's got the ability to put the fertiliser down on one time quite deep, and the ability to have the seed going on another time with the press wheel behind it, so the press wheel maintains the depth of the seed into the ground."

Mr Hastings says the change in farming systems and spending by Government and farmers in research and development has helped.

Thirty years ago Mr Hastings' barley crop would have struggled to yield even a fifth of a tonne per hectare.

Today it is a different story and it is because of direct drilling.

"They are retaining all their stubble and keeping all the organic matter here in place instead of it all blowing away so it's got away from cultivation and it seems to be working," farmer Deane Munro said.

Mr Munro agrees 1982 was a shocking year for farmers.

"It was quite dry," he said.

""In 1982 the entire area pretty much just blew away and I can remember seeing fences covered in with dirt and paddocks just crossing roads," he said.

Despite this year's poor season, farmers in the Ouyen region are making the best of it.

"We have had less than six inches of rain for the year and out of that two and a half was before cropping," Mr Munro said.

Many farmers are likely to make a loss, but they say it could have been much worse.

They're still not brilliant, but at least we've got something.

Deane Munro, Ouyen farmer

"Considering that we are going to be not far behind cutting even, that's a bloody good outcome for us," Mr Munro said.

"I think most people are going to be disappointed the way the year has gone, it's hard to take a loss no matter how your outlook on life is, but having said that everyone can't believe they've got the crops they have got.